


The Shakespeare Showdown

by recurringdreams



Category: British Actor RPF
Genre: Angst, Arguing, F/M, Fluff, Misunderstandings, Romance, Shakespeare, jealous!Tom
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-14
Updated: 2013-10-04
Packaged: 2017-12-23 12:28:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/926434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/recurringdreams/pseuds/recurringdreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adapted from the Prompts Blog:</p><p>Tom finds out that his girlfriend super-admires another actor who's tackled the same role as he has. This leads to jealousy, arguing and 'you like him more than me!'</p><p>And, of course, a happy ending. </p><p>Disclaimer: I own neither Tom Hiddleston Nor Jamie Parker and the characters in this story, although sharing similar characteristics to the actors, are works of fiction. Any reflection of real events is a supernatural coincidence.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

She was reading when he came in, curled up on his sofa with a copy of Henry V open in her lap, the spine tucked in the crease between her legs, as she slowly read over the words. In the smallest of voices, she was murmuring, mumbling, whispering the speech that had captured his heart when he had read it the first time.

_"But if it be a sin to covet honour,_  
 _I am the most offending soul alive._  
 _No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:_  
 _God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour_  
 _As one man more, methinks, would share from me_  
 _For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!"_

"Act four, scene three, darling?" He chuckled as she paused for breath, and to turn the page, "I had no idea that you liked Henry?"

"Oh! I... Well..." She blushed and looked away, "I thought I would have another read of it, and it turns out I rather... Well, this time I rather enjoyed it." She smiled slightly and her shoulders relaxed as she smiled up at him, her eyes glinting in the light of their reading lamp, "welcome home, love."

"I've missed you, darling." He smiled broadly and leaned down to kiss her, his lips finding her forehead, then her cheeks, her nose and finally her lips, "how have you been?"

"Sick with worry, desperate for sex, starving hungry, since you banned me from using your cooker." She chuckled and pulled him in for another kiss, her lips grazing along his jaw as she pulled back and away, "I missed you, but I coped. And I caught up on various TV series and films while you were gone. That's what I'm supposed to do, right?"

"I couldn't think of a better coping strategy." Smiling peacefully, he settled on the sofa beside her and lifted her feet into his lap. Briefly, a pained look crossed her face, and he realised that he had disturbed her reading bubble, moving her slightly out of joint as she adjusted to him being there again. "Sorry, love," he whispered, kissing her knee as he moved to set her foot back down, but she was already dog-earing her page and setting the play aside.

"Don't be silly, love. I'd rather curl up in your lap than curl up with a good book." Her hands wound into his hair as she spoke and her feet slipped into the space between his thighs and the sofa cushion. "You're full of stories and characters yourself. How could I resist that?"

Tom smiled, stroking his fingers through her hair and slowly finding the space between her shoulder blades where he knew the tattoo of an open book rested, playing slowly up and down the lines that he knew rested there, that he knew intimately, knew the taste of and smell of, and Christ if he didn't change the subject he would be hard in half a minute.

"I could read it to you, if you like?"

"No, no. It's fine." She smiled, quietly moving the book another inch out of his reach, "I'd rather hear stories from the set of your latest blockbuster!" She said the last word in a movie-announcer voice and chuckled, trying her hardest to steer the conversation away from him performing for her as Henry.

She would never tell him, but he just wasn't her King.


	2. Chapter 1

Now, please. Please, please, please don't get her wrong here, Thomas William Hiddleston is, was and always would be the man of her dreams. He was kinder than Captain Nicholls, funnier than Freddie Page (and a much nicer drunk), more sneaky than Loki when he wanted to be, and just as dedicated as Magnus-off-Wallander. He was, in some way, the sum of his characters, but in the same way, sometimes, he forgot that he was more. Sometimes, his mind wandered down the silent, tree-lined path that made him forget that as an actor, he inhabited the character, rather than the character inhabiting him. 

 

Sometimes she wondered whether that was the reason his portrayal of Hal and Henry didn't quite sit right for her - because Tom had let Henry into his bones, had been up at all hours, twisting and turning to make two bodies fit, and it hadn't quite... settled. It was strange, because the play had been her favourite for a long while, and she had desperately wanted to love his performance as Hal, and then as King Henry, in The Hollow Crown. While she watched it, however, she had spent an inordinate lot of time thinking that somehow - and if you asked her, she would never be able to define it - it was inferior to the performance she'd seen a while back, onstage at The Globe.

 

Her mind drifted back to the slight smell of sawdust, the straw hat she had been wearing, the ache in her heels as she had stood for three hours just to hear him cry out.

 

"Cry God for Harry! England! And Saint George!"

 

But the reminiscence was all too brief, as the distinct smell of Tom's cologne brought her straight back to the present. Tom was here now. Tom was there, and wrapped around her. Her boyfriend was talking. He was looking at her, his fingers were creeping up her leg. She smiled and lifted her hand to his cheek, kissed him to stop him from talking about the sound tech nearly dropping boiling hot soup over his lap and to distract herself from thoughts of another man performing.

 

She wondered whether it counted as cheating, preferring another actor's performance over the performance of the man she was in love with. Especially something as important to him as this. As Henry. 

 

She felt guilty even imagining the soft, slightly hoarse caress of Jamie Parker's voice as he mumbled, "Do you like me, Kate?" during Act 5, Scene 2, and felt positively damnable when she heard him whisper, "You have witchcraft in your lips," and shivered at the sound. Conversely, everything - well, not quite everything, but many things - about Tom's delivery of certain lines and passages had put her off the play for a long while, only returning to it when she found out that Jamie's version had been filmed and was currently in its packaging on the coffee table, delivered by Amazon half an hour before work this morning, almost vibrating in its conspicuousness, a brown cardboard package amongst white paper envelopes...

 

It wasn't Tom's fault, of course, and she could never love him less for taking it on, just... She preferred another actor in the role. It shouldn't have made her feel bad, but it did, because it meant the world to the man who was currently attempting - and failing - to undo the buckle on her belt, pull her jeans off and, not to put too fine a point on it, lick her like there was no tomorrow, and he meant the universe to her.

 

"Mmmm... Love, where are you tonight?" He whispered, still fumbling at her hips as his mouth made gentle encroachments at the corner of her mouth, "aren't you pleased to see me?"

 

"It's not that," she hurried out, her fingers entwining into his hair as she pulled him into deeper and deeper kisses, their tongues tangling slowly as she tried to dominate, but eventually submitted control to him, letting him press her into the sofa cushions, nuzzle at the juncture between her shoulder and her neck, and pull back to look her in the eye as she revealed a half truth. "It's a bit overwhelming."

 

"Darling?"

 

"Having you back so suddenly, and all to myself," and you catching me readying myself for a night with Henry V, "I sort of don't know how to process it."

 

"Oh." He rocked back onto his knees and stroked her cheek, "You weren't expecting me to be randy? Or... Well, so eager?" His cheeks took on a faint, embarrassed flush, and she smiled, shaking her head, "then what, darling?"

 

"I wasn't expecting you home until tomorrow, if I'm perfectly honest, love." She smiled and kissed him, "Your flight wasn't supposed to land until the wee hours."

 

"I couldn't stay away from you." he said, eyeing her sappily as she pulled away and rolled her eyes.

 

"Ew! Gross!" she laughed and clutched at his shoulders as he chuckled just as loudly.

 

Neither of them were especially great at sentiment, and Tom knew full well that moments of romance and emotion such as the one he had played up to there were most unwelcome in both of their books. He withdrew a little, looking into her eyes with a small smile.

 

"I did miss you. Truly I did." 

 

"I know, love." Her fingers skittered over his cheekbones and down to the stubble at his jaw. "I laid awake at night wishing you were with me." The truth laid bare. She adored him. She didn't want to sleep without him. It was hard to sleep when his warmth wasn't wrapped around her. She wanted to show him, somehow, that they were perfect the way they were.

 

"Let me read to you tonight?" Usually, the answer was an immediate yes, the combination soporific tones to draw her into the land of slumber and the kindly circles drawn slowly onto her upper arms would send her jumping for a chance to listen to him. But tonight, she knew there was only one book on his mind.

 

"No Henry." she murmured, folding her arms and levelling a firm stare at him, "that's my veto."

 

"But love, Henry is... Well its pure poetry. So beautifully nuanced, so intelligent..."

 

"No Henry." she repeated it more firmly, her eyes glinting in the dark, "Please, love. Anything but."

 

He eyed her silently, wondering exactly what had made her so firm in her decision, whether she was still unsure about the play itself or whether it was his delivery which put her off. He thought he might ask, but not today. 

 

If she didn't want to listen to him read from Henry V, then she would definitely enjoy the sensuality in another of his favourites. He rose slowly, kissing her hand as he did, and slipped Venus and Adonis from the shelf.

 

Today was about rekindling their kisses, kissing her gently for every day they'd been apart and making her scream with pleasure for every night she had spent alone. His hands traced up and down her shoulders as he stood behind her, and he grinned as he gently turned her head so that she was looking him in the eyes. 

 

"Bedtime, then, darling? I have plans for you." Waving the book in his right hand, he stroked her cheek with his left.

 

"B-bedtime?" with the pile of Jamie Parker DVDs on his side of the bed? With The History Boys still in her Laptop, paused at Scripps playing the piano? With... With...

 

"Yes! Come on!" He was already halfway up the stairs, and she knew, just knew that she was for it now.

 

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.


	3. 2

 

\---:::---

 

She closed her eyes as he reached the bedroom door, three paces ahead of her as she had raced up the stairs to stop him. 

"Wait! Wait please," she cried, swallowing nervously as he stopped with one hand on the door handle and the other on the frame, "Whatever you see in there... It's not what you think."

It's not what you think. Fuck, it's not what you think. Five words to turn whatever he was thinking into the worst thought in the world. There could be a copy of Jane Eyre in there, laid open on the bed and right now he would see it and assume she'd be touching herself to thoughts of Mr. Rochester, or something just as obscene. Seeing the pile of films with one recurring actor would most definitely put his back up. 

"What do you mean? Love, I don't think there's anything you would ever have to hide from me."

Then he pushed the door open. 

\--::--

Their bedroom was naturally a combination of mess and order, her side of the room neatly packaged, books in order and CDs tucked away in a cabinet, his side strewn with clothes, usually living out of an opened suitcase with his underwear laid on the back of his chair. The darkness of the early evening meant that the only light was from the steady on-off throb of her laptop, charging on the bedside table and illuminating the pile of DVDs that rested on Tom's pillow. 

"What do we have here?" He grinned and flicked the light on, "made yourself a nest to watch my films in while I'm away?"

"Kinda," she giggled nervously, hiding her face as he threw himself onto the bed and looked at the pile of movies. 

"The History Boys, Valkyrie, Parade's End, The Hour..." He looked up, "I thought this was a nest of 'I miss my boyfriend' films?" As he spoke, the playful grin slipped from his face and returned as a mask of frustration.

He was upset. She didn't want him upset. _Please don't be upset, Tom._

"No, it's a nest of distraction films." Her voice was too defensive. Her face was beet red. She knew she was in trouble and she knew that she should have thought about clearing up way before he got home.

When Tom was tired, nervous, feeling low or frustrated, he often turned to her for comfort. She was his rock, and as such, a lot of his self-esteem seeped from the adoration she offered him. She loved his performance. That meant it was worth it. She wanted to watch that, or this, or those episodes... Which meant they were the best, meant his performance was the best. Meant he was the best in her eyes. 

If she wasn't happy watching him, if she wanted to watch someone else, before him... 

All of a sudden he felt sick, his stomach churned and he put the case for The History Boys down to the side. 

"Who is he?" He swallowed, "Which one?"

"It's not anyone, Tom. I just wanted to watch those when I found out Jamie's version of Henry the fifth was out on DVD and I... I dunno. I wanted to see what it was like. What he was like." 

"Jamie?" Suddenly his eyes were blazing, "Jamie Parker?" 

"Y-yeah?"

"You do know he's married?" He scoffed and she rolled her eyes. 

"I don't find him attractive, Tom."

"You find his performances attractive!" He glared and stared at the pile of DVDs, before standing up and looming over her, "is he better than me? Did you like his Henry more than mine?"

She hesitated. 

She made the mistake of hesitating and she was cursing herself as she heard the words leave her mouth. 

"He was different. And... I preferred the Globe version to The Hollow Crown, love. But it's not because he was in it." She held her hands up, embarrassed a bit by the entire situation, "I just preferred it. It's nothing to do with either of you."

"You don't like my Henry?" Now he sounded wounded, his eyes downcast. 

She knew, the moment that their eyes locked, that he was either going to crumple or explode. Her hands shook as she reached out to him and bit her bottom lip, taking a deep breath. 

"Do you want me to tell you the absolute truth, love?"

He nodded, and she steeled herself, her eyes hardening as she looked up at him. 

"I didn't like the setting, or the delivery of it. I liked you in it but your performance was never going to be my definitive Henry. It was darker than the Globe performance and to me it's... Well, it's not what I was looking for."

He took it like an arrow to the chest. 

He rested back on his hands and took a breath, eyeing her again with a puppy-dog stare.

"You really liked his better?"

"For God's sake, love, yes, I enjoyed his performance at the Globe two years ago better than your performance. I think he's a wonderful actor, I like his style and I enjoy his performances. But I love you. I am in love with you."

"But not with the work that I do?"

"You're being unreasonable." 

"Answer the question!"

"Tom, you're being ridiculous! I love your work and I love the things you do. I love everything about you. Why are you not... Why don't you get it into your head that I adore you?"

"Because you don't!"

She wanted to shriek. She wanted to scream and shout and throw things. Tom's self-esteem, his self-image, it was fragile, she knew that much, but to hear him throw the truth in her face, to tell her that her feelings weren't true, just because she liked the performances of another actor...

It was a bit much. 

"Tom, if you think this means I'm being unfaithful or untrue to you, just because I've watched some films with another man in... Tom, you're acting insane."

"Oh, another role you don't like me in!"

"No, Tom! I don't like it when you act jealous for no fucking reason!" She snapped, utterly done wi his attitude, "because, Tom, it's bullshit. I love you, I want you and I'm not going to leave you for anything! There's nobody else I want!"

"You might not want to leave me!"

The threat hung in the air ominously, and she went still, biting her lip and fighting the tears.

"Say it. Go on, say it and then walk out." Her voice was soft, deadly smooth, and papered over the ache that burned in her stomach, and flooded up to her heart. "I dare you, Thomas. I dare you to say it."

"I'm sleeping on the settee."

Without another word, he stormed out, slamming the bedroom door behind him.


	4. 3

Without another word, he stormed out, slamming the bedroom door behind him.

\---:::---

The living room was mostly silent as he stormed down the stairs, the only sounds coming from the fast ticking of the clock in the corner, and the soft tinkle of their knick-knacks as they rattled in place with each stomp Tom made towards the settee.

"What are you looking at?" He grunted at the picture of them both at the press night of one of his plays, early in their relationship. Scowling, he flipped it face down, wincing slightly as he heard a tiny tinkle and crack of the glass front hitting the wood of the mantelpiece.

Feeling ashamed that he had even thought about turning their pictures away, he carefully lifted it and stood it back on the side, sighing as he noticed the tiny little crack in the corner of the frame. She would be furious with him, and rightly so. This was only one of three pictures they had of themselves, and he'd all but thrown it on the floor and stomped on it.

He still sort of wanted to do just that.

He felt sick. He felt tired, and perhaps worst of all, he felt unloved. His heart had lurched early in the evening - when he had seen her reading Henry V without him curled up around her - when she had practically vetoed him reading to her, his chest had tightened and he worried that either he was coming on too strong, or that she was tiring of him.

He could understand why she would - his days were often long, and his shoots and travel schedule were often longer. This time, he had been gone for three weeks, each day, he had been at work for nigh on sixteen hours, early mornings to late nights and he had hardly been able to get ten minutes to himself, let alone half an hour for a Skype call to tell her how much he missed her.

_When they had first started dating, she had sent him emails while he was away, sending over all the gossip on her life, things that his sister had sent her, things that she thought he might like to hear about. He wouldn't always answer them, but it was okay, because she sent them anyway, and she knew he read them. She trusted that he would read them, at least._

_It was during the shoot for "Unhurried" that she found out that he wasn't reading them. A few days after he had left, her period had gone awry and she had emailed him about it, telling him that she was scared that she might be pregnant and that she didn't know what was going on, but they needed to talk about it on Skype that weekend. She signed it off by asking that if he had ten minutes, it would really calm her down to hear his voice._

_Obviously, he didn't call, swept up in doing press for Thor Three, and filming scenes for Unhurried in between. She had sent him a message about times she would be free on the Sunday - knowing it was his scheduled day off - and she had waited by her laptop all day for him._

_She hadn't heard for him for two weeks before she stopped thinking the best of him and called him, asking him if he'd got her messages and if he was angry with her or the situation and whether he could forgive her. When he hadn't been able to understand why she was so upset, he realised that he had been neglecting her feelings, as well as her emails. She, however, had realised that he hadn't read the messages that she had been sending._

_"You're hardly invested in us!" She had sobbed, "I don't know if you care, I spend a lot of time on doing things for you. For hiding our relationship so the press don't go mad, for trying not to be too clingy, for not missing your voice and when you do this-"_

He had thought that was in the past. They had split up for a month, both of them driving their friends insane with their worrying and sniffling, their whining and whittling, and their obvious sexual frustration.

But then they'd talked. They'd held hands and apologised and told each other that they really did love each other, but that neither of them knew quite how to handle it. Tom had never understood what it was like to come home to a dark house every night and not be able to curl up next to the one you loved, whilst she had never really understood that the high-pressure nature of his jobs meant that he sometimes couldn't face thinking of home.

It was enough for them to come to an agreement. He would try to call her, Skype her, even text her to tell her how much he missed her, but she had to remember that it couldn't always happen. In reality, and the longer he had thought about it, she lost in this situation, and there was no escaping that. There were no guarantees to his side of the bargain, and she would be left behind.

About three jobs after the incident, however, it wasn't mentioned any longer. She didn't try to push him into calling her, and their contact waned from three(ish) emails and a phonecall a week, to maybe an email _or_ a call every fortnight. He had wondered what was going on, but was scared to actually find out.

So he had left it. And their hands would touch and she would squeeze his fingers and smile at him but he was sure that there was something wrong. He didn't quite know what, but something was wrong.

He rolled over on the sofa and sighed again, staring at the photo and curling his toes around the cushion at the other end.

She didn't understand how it felt. She didn't understand that because she didn't hold his hand as long as he wanted to - was that what felt wrong? - that because her smiles weren't just for him, that because she had pushed away his Henry and let somebody else provide in that tiny part of her life... That it was obviously only a matter of time before she gave up on him? That she would walk out on the time he couldn't spend with her, the lonely nights and takeaways for one and find someone who could take a day off a week, cuddle up with her at night and go to the cinema with her without getting mobbed for autographs at the turn of every corner.

Of course he was jealous, because Jamie Parker could do that with his wife, come home after a stage performance and kiss her and give her a cuddle and Tom couldn't. He could sit and pine and of course she wanted someone better than him! Of course she wanted someone who could give her everything that she deserved.

He couldn't give her that. He couldn't give her anything like that.

In the darkness, he blushed, first with embarrassment, and then with tears of fury and frustration in his eyes. He felt suffocated, confused and his stomach hurt, in a combination of jealousy and embarrassment, and quietly slipped out from under the blanket, scowling miserably as he crept up the stairs, and eyed her through the crack in the doorway. She was curled up on his side of the bed, the end credits of something playing on her laptop, so low that he couldn't hear what it was. Her eyes were glassy in the low light, she looked as though she was crying.

He couldn't deal with it, though. His chest was tight and he wanted to throw up. Before he knew it, he had his shoes on and he was outside the front door, his jacket around his shoulders and his car keys in his hand.

He had to be somewhere else.


	5. 4

\---:::---

She had known without a doubt that he would storm off, and she had known without a doubt that it would be her fault. His jealousy was always her fault, his insecurity? Her fault. The fact that he wouldn't just take some time off and be with her? Well that was probably her fault as well, but she'd never ask. She was cleverer than that. She had realised a long time ago that to get along with him, to have a solid relationship with him... It was better not to ask for much. 

Their relationship - at the beginning at least - had been plenty of give and take; she'd give an hour, and he'd take two, making her late back to work from her lunch hour and risk her job for him. She did an awful lot of grovelling, an awful lot of late nights, working to make up for it - not always easy on tight schedules and early morning deadlines but she did an awful lot of begging for extensions. It was easier now, she had gone back to school and pulled a PGCE from nowhere, spending her time teaching English to sixth formers in a college only twenty minutes away by tube. 

Her fingers fisted in her hair as she thought about what she had given to him. What she had offered and what he had taken and how she had let him slip into her heart as her defences had dropped. She had known that letting him into her world would make it shake and rattle, that their relationship would never be normal - she would never be normal as long as they were together, associated with each other - and that she had an awful lot to gain by walking away. 

She pulled hard and let the pain burst through her scalp and along the nerves in her neck as she punished herself for such a stupid thought. Why should she leave him when, when they were together, they were amazing. They were fun, and caring, and sensual. They enjoyed their time together, had the same likes and dislikes, and they played stupid games together. They argued about stupid little things like children, but made up like adults, came back to each other and talked it out. She pulled harder as she considered how they would come back from this, baring her neck to what may come and cringed, her chest burning with tears that glistened at the corners of her eyes and spilled onto her lashes. 

She did not want to think, want to work out what to do. It was likely that Tom would be upset until the morning, decide to sweep it under the rug and curl up around her in the early hours. It was Sunday tomorrow. Days off were all the sweeter when you had finished your marking and planning the day before and could cuddle up on the sofa with a good book, and a great boyfriend. Quietly, she pulled up one of the episodes of Wallander that Tom was in. She loved to look at him, watch him intently even though he had only half the screen-time that he deserved. It seemed, when she was with him, that there were never enough hours in the day for them to get what they wanted, to do what they wanted together. His job pushed from his side. Her job snuck in under the radar and presented problems too. She wanted to be with him. He acted like he wanted her to miss him. _Constantly_.

The stairs creaked and she looked up, head directed at her laptop screen, but eyes flickering towards the door. She felt him, rather than saw him, after a few seconds of silence. Desperate to invite him in, to have it out and apologise, then cuddle up to him before they fell asleep, she opened her mouth, but by the time his name left her in a desperate sigh, she could hear his footsteps thundering down the stairs and then the door. The front door was open and slamming and _oh god he had left_. 

"Tom?" She sat bolt upright, "Tom! Don't do this!" But she knew it was too late, there was nothing to bring him back now. Her heart lurched in her chest and she was on her feet in a heartbeat, her fingers and toes tingling with fear as she flicked every light on she could reach, running down the stairs to stop him. It was too late. It was too late. Too late. Too late. Too late- her heartbeat was thundering in her ears as she wrenched the front door open only for the bright lights of his headlamps to illuminate her as the car pulled out of the driveway. 

She was blinded for the longest moment, blinking frantically to try to restore her vision, but nothing was happening. Nothing was coming back as she slumped against the doorframe. She knew she was being melodramatic as she let out a wail of frustration and kicked at the wood panelling her chest heaving miserably. 

"Fuck." She grunted, kicking the door hard again, "Fucking _fuck_! You stupid cow, why couldn't you just be happy?" She let out another wail as she caught her foot awkwardly and gave up, falling in through the door and stumbling to the living room, reaching for the blanket on the sofa and slipping underneath it, whimpering softly at the scent of Tom's cologne as it wrapped around her. 

Her chest pounded as she laid awake, watching the ceiling for some sign of the headlights sweeping back into their driveway, listening for the key in the door and the soft sigh of his voice as he realised that she had come after him, but been stranded alone after he had raced away in his car. She swallowed around the lump in her throat as she waited, feeling the tears burn at her eyes until, her breathing evening out, she fell into a deep, miserable sleep. 

It was half past four when she woke again, hyper-aware of the crunch of gravel in the driveway and the soft sound of the key in the lock. She thought about getting up, running away so he couldn't see her, locking herself in the bathroom and sleeping in the tub or something, but she realised immediately that doing such a thing was stupid. She didn't fear Tom. She didn't fear what he had to say - or what she had to say, though she wasn't entirely sure whether the words would come when she needed them. The door made a soft 'snick' as the lock turned and he padded inside, toeing off his shoes and pacing his way through to the kitchen. 

She heard the kettle start to boil, and a few minutes later the strong scent of coffee permeated the lower level of the house. She sat up, clearing her throat softly as he passed the living room door. He stilled and turned towards her. 

"Love?" Neither was sure who said it first, so she ploughed on, and shifted up. "Come and sit down, please? I think we need to talk."


	6. 5

Neither of them spoke for the longest time, as Tom moved through the living room to sit down carefully on the coffee table. There was a crinkle of shiny magazine front covers as he wriggled left and right to get comfortable, knowing, however that no matter how much he shifted, the soft tingles of discomfort in his hips would not be leaving his body anytime soon.

"You ran out on me, earlier." She started, after moments of silence where they tried to look anywhere but at each other and ended up staring straight into each other's eyes. "It scared me, because I didn't know where you had gone or what you were doing or..." Her voice rose and she spoke faster as her nerves got the better of her. A few deep breaths and she blinked once, slowly, then continued on, "or whether you were hurt or scared or you didn't want to speak to me again."

"At the time I was all three of those things." He said slowly, his eyes trained on her knees, "at the time I got in the car I was jealous and I was angry. I was upset, love. But I don't think I am anymore."

She was entirely agog, turning her eyes to his face as the words left his mouth. _He wasn't upset?_

"Love," she said simply, "I think... I don't think that's how this is all supposed to work. I'll... I'll tell you my side and then... That's how it goes, right? We talk it out, like adults."

"We are adults." He nodded, simply, "it's the best way to talk it out."

He sounded so flat, so resigned and empty, that her heart lurched and she wanted to give him an out. Any out. Anything to give him time to be her Tom again.

"If you're not ready to, we can leave it till morning?"

"No. Not at all. We should do this now. It'll be easier."

"Okay. Well, I'll... I'll start?" He simply nodded for her to go on. "For the longest time, I think I've resented you being able to go away and work and enjoy yourself and... I dunno, walk away? Without seeing that I'm at home, stuck in the living room or the dining room or anything like that, because the moment I leave the house to see my friends, _'Tom Hiddleston's Girlfriend Goes Out With Man'_. I get lonely, when you're gone, and I get scared and I get miserable and sometimes I feel kinda trapped, but I know that it would hurt ten million times more to leave and that loving you... Sometimes I feel like its the only thing I can do." She took a deep breath and hung her head slowly, "I love you _desperately_ , Thomas Hiddleston, why can't you see that?"

"I can." He said simply, reaching out to take her hand, "My turn?"

"Of course."

"Darling, you mean the world to me. Which is why I over-react when I have been away for so long, and come back, desperate to see you and it seems like you haven't missed me." He took a deep breath and focused on her fingers, stroking each one as he said his piece, "I took one look at the covers of those DVDs and I realised... You don't need me. Not really. You can live without me."

He spoke in a manner to which she was entirely unaccustomed to hearing from him. Flat, empty, almost dead.

"But I don't want to! I've never wanted to live without you but you give me no choice! Eight months of the year, Tom! I live without you and I make my way and you go to premieres I can't make because I can't take days off school like that without weeks of notice and all I want is for you to trust that I want to be with you but Tom you have to actually let me!" She realised there were tears on her cheeks and that she was panting, loudly, obscenely, her heart breaking as he sat there, his eyes on her knees and his hands slowly receding into his lap.

When he looked up again, his expression was stunned.

"Has it really been eight months of the year that I've been away?"

"Yes, Tom." She nodded simply, "it's been eight months, with five weeks of stolen nights and weekends away and..." She wiped her eyes quietly, sniffing, and she found a tissue pressed gently into her hand after only half a breath, "thank you."

"I had no idea that I had hurt you like that, darling." Though he had known that he had beenhurting her desperately as he had no time for phone calls, or Skype calls or... "I've been a bit of a bastard, haven't I?"

"A little bit." She whispered, embarrassed and shy.

"We ought to do something about that, eh?"

"I'd like that, Tom." She nodded quietly, running her fingers through her hair. "But I don't know what we can do. You work, Tom. That's what you do. Films, on set in Hollywood and on location in Africa and on location everywhere else! I-I think I could take it if you filmed in London, once in a while, stayed at home and came back to me in the evenings, but..." She took a breath and looked away, "you're just so far away."

He took a deep breath and eyed her carefully, weighing his thoughts alongside his words.

"The way I see it," he murmured after a few minutes of concentrated silence, so softly that she had to lean forward to hear the words he was saying, "there are two options we take. You come to me, or I come to you." He gently rested his fingers against her cheek, "option one, I continue taking the jobs all over the world, and you quit your job and take substitute work wherever I am, for the duration of the shoots. That would mean that we'd be together, but be way away from home for the duration." He watched her for a few seconds, gauging her reactions and nodding as he saw her expression change from calm to disappointed. She looked up at him, almost sad that this had been his first choice, but knowing that there was very little she could do. "I don't like that option. I don't want to take you away from the life you've built and I don't want to force you into leaving your home to follow me around with no guarantees of you being able to earn and be who you truly are. If we took that option, I would be making you my kept woman. That's not right."

"You spent a long time thinking about this, didn't you?"

"Six hours driving back and forth between London bridge and Westminster bridge. It's amazing what it'll do for your perspective." He lightly squeezed her knee, "want to hear option two?"

"Yeah, I... I really would."

"Okay, this one's the one that I really think might work." Slowly, he moved to sit beside her, pulling the blanket over his knees, "I take two jobs in another country per year. Maximum total of time away; three months, not during the long school holidays. The rest of the time, I work on plays, I work on films, and I work on TV shows that are here, in Britain. I will come home every night, and wake up with you in the mornings" He squeezed her knee, "Any press tours scheduled over the holidays, you come with me. Any press tours or filming time scheduled during term, I call you every other night. Guaranteed. Luke schedules it in, around both of our schedules and we make it work. I will make every effort I can to be in contact with you." He squeezed a little tighter, "because I don't want to be without you, and if I keep treating you this way... I'm going to lose you. And that would break my heart."

She gaped at him. And gaped, and gaped, and stared a little longer. He was offering her a compromise that would effectively shrink his career down to a fifth of its size. He was asking her to trust that he would, and could make the effort, for her. She desperately wanted to believe him, but realised that she was asking an awful lot of him to do this.

"Well?" He asked, nerves rising in his chest as she took a deep breath and sighed. "Sound good?"

"It sounds incredible, Tom. But... Is it too much?"


	7. 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long to get out! Back at uni and settling in for my MA year, so expect a hella lot more of this to appear when I'm fully down with the work!

"Well?" He asked, nerves rising in his chest as she took a deep breath and sighed. "Sound good?"  
  
"It sounds incredible, Tom. But... Is it too much?"  
  
\---:::---  
  
 _In reality, it sounded too good to be true.  
_  
"Darling," he kissed her temple, "whatever it takes, I want it to work." She gripped the blanket gently, hoping against hope that her tears would not spill over. Her heart was pounding in her chest and her skin was crawling, at the thought of more disappointment, more upheaval, more hurt that she couldn't take.   
  
"I want it to work too, Tom. But I..." She twisted the blanket gently in her fingers, nibbling her bottom lip, "the thing is, Tom. If you break this promise, it's like every other promise you've ever made me. Completely worthless. What... What I need is a guarantee."   
  
"A guarantee?" His heart jumped quietly and he twisted his fingers lightly. Was she asking for him to make... _That_ commitment? He wasn't ready for anything like that, marriage was a terrifying prospect and he was only thirty-five and... She was talking. Look at her, she’s talking to you, Thomas.  
  
"Tom, I'm not asking for a marriage proposal," she whispered gently, nudging his knee with hers to break him gently out of his reverie, "I'm asking for a sincere, honest commitment, which might take some work between us, not just a promise that goes for six weeks and then filters out like the dodo.”

“I don’t understand…”

“I mean, there has to be a clause that says if one of us fucks up, we don’t let it stay that way. You miss an email, you call me instead. I miss a Skype date, I send you filthy pictures via email. Some kind of give and take, rather than waiting around for the other one to call. Rather than running out of the door when we’re afraid. Balance. Remembering that I can’t be up at all hours, so sometimes you’ll have to take time out of your day. Remembering that you’ll have to take time out of some of your days to actively come to me, Tom.” She smiled slightly, well aware that it was a big commitment for a busy man to make. “That’s what I need. To be a block in your schedule, rather than just a blip on your radar.”

“I can do that.” He said, taking her hand now, more confident that he could fulfil his promise. “Darling, I will do that. I _will.”_

There were no further words to be said on the matter. His will was his word, and as he had made that promise, he leaned forward and kissed her gently on the lips, breathing her name as he pulled away.

In response, she smiled, dragging her fingers through her hair. It was soft, and curled, and only now did Tom notice the way it fell to her shoulders, rather than so far down her back, as he was accustomed.

“You’ve had a haircut.”

“I have.” She nodded, “And a new tattoo. And I was doing some reading about a holiday. For two. Soon.” She smiled, “I’d like some time away with you, schedule permitting, of course.”

“Schedule permitting, I’d love to escape the world with you.” He grinned and slowly moved the blankets from her, leaning forward to capture her lips once again. “But I’ve missed this world. Truly I have. Our world, here, now, means a lot to me, more than I think you could ever imagine. I spend an awfully long time trying to forget that, and focus on the sets and locations, the characters and costumes, but, my love, you are always on my mind.”

“Could have fooled me,” She said, with just the tiniest trace of hurt in her voice.

“I’ve been an arse.” He kissed her gently, “An arrogant, pompous arse, with no consideration for your feelings. I was angry earlier, but now I realise that I was never angry with you. It was with myself, for leading you to feel like that.” Another kiss, and she was returning the pressure of his lips with her own, gently melting one taste into another, until they were locked at the mouth and making headway to joining their bodies as well as their lips.

He lifted her easily once he had whispered the question, her legs wrapping around his hips as she gripped the collar of his stress-rumpled shirt, creases appearing in the seconds that she held the fabric between her fingers. She giggled as he set her down on the bed, gently and slowly, her shirt – stolen from him one night and never returned – slipping from her shoulder and exposing the see-through lace of her bra.

“I love this,” He hissed, his tongue tracing down the length of the strap, over collarbone and shoulder to the curve of her breast and the arc of her nipple until he was tasting, sucking, nibbling gently at her skin. She whimpered at the sensation, the dampness of the lace as it brushed against her heated skin, the gentleness of his fingers, kneading into her skin, and the roughness of his teeth, brushing against her and making her want to shriek out loud.

“God! Me too,” She laughed, writhing under the intensity of his touch, the earnestness of his mouth against her body and the brightness of his eyes as they stared up at her, waiting for her to call out his name. “Tom! Stop it!” She giggled, panting as his other hand trailed up her side. “I want your mouth somewhere else!”

He snorted, raising goosebumps against her skin.

“Oi! Perv, I didn’t actually mean southwards!” She laughed, lightly poking him in the side, “Naughty man.” A gentle swat to her favourite man’s backside, and she chuckled, “Have me?”

“Much obliged, madam!” He grinned, going to work on the shirt buttons keeping his skin from pressing against hers.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don’t worry, I’m not passing on the smut! Next Chapter! :)


End file.
